European Union News - Internal Market

The European Commission presented a European Retail Action Plan to avoid a number of barriers that hinder the smooth functioning of cross-border sourcing, consumer access to cross-border retail services and market entry for retailers. At the same time, the Commission launched a public consultation on unfair trading practices in the business-to-business food and non-food supply chain.

UPS which is a US-based global provider of specialised transportation and logistics services proposed to acquire TNT Express, a Dutch company also active in the global logistics sector. Now, the European Commission prohibited the proposed acquisition because the take-over would have restricted competition in 15 Member States when it comes to the express delivery of small packages to another European country.

The European Commission published that in January 2013, the Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) increased by 1.4 points in both the EU and the euro area. For the same month, the Business Climate Indicator (BCI) for the euro area remained broadly unchanged at -1.09.

The European Commission reminds on the European Data Protection Day 2013 its proposal to reform the EU’s data protection rules launched one year ago. According to the Commission, strong, reliable, consistently applied rules in this field will make data processing safer, cheaper and strengthen people’s confidence.

The Prospects for Agricultural Markets and Income in the EU published by the European Commission shows a relatively positive outlook for arable crops in the EU, as a result of solid world demand and firm prices.

The Internal Market Committee in the European Parliament voted to allow authorities to accept not just the lowest bid, but the "most economically advantageous tender" with regard to the "utility" services. The Committee highlighted that the new rules on utility service contracts should also aim to make it easier for small and medium-sized enterprises to bid for them and to encourage innovation.

The European Commission highlights that thanks to the regulatory pressure the percentage of number of women on boards ranged from 13.7% to 15.8% in January 2012. In addition, the Commission stressed that the increase in the share of women on boards has been recorded in all but three EU countries: Bulgaria, Poland and Ireland.

The Internal Committee in the European Parliament endorsed an draft agreement with the Council to give customs officials at EU borders better tools to confiscate, store and destroy goods that infringe intellectual property rights.

The Internal Market Committee at the European Parliament backed the public procurement "concession" contracts in a vote held the 24 of January. According to MEPs, these "concession" contracts enable public authorities to transfer the economic risk of projects such as building roads bridges or sports arenas to the private sector. MEPs stressed that the attribution of a concession is not synonymous with privatisation of public services.